One Foot in Front of the Other
by detective-sweetheart
Summary: He isn't particularly sure where he'll land this time, but there is relief in knowing someone will care to know when he does.


**A/N: So...just finished watching "Burn Card" and that last scene really got to me. Here's to hoping that this all makes sense. As you all know, I don't own TOS or any of the characters. **

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It is liberation, but it isn't relief.

What he finds somewhat amusing about this is that once upon a time, he'd thought that he'd only leave the department when he got too old or when they finally got tired of him. Once upon a time, there had been a point where he'd believed that everything happened for a reason, but that point came and went. Now there is motive and opportunity and a whole bunch of other things that ultimately lead to someone ending up dead and someone else ending up arrested.

The stupid thing about it is that justice isn't always served.

People are acquitted, people are convicted, but sometimes the acquitted ones really are guilty, and the convicted ones really are innocent. He has seen too much of it to believe that the system is flawless. And he never really thought that he would be brought up in front of a grand jury, nor did he think that he'd be put on trial for murder, or even that Cutter would be stubborn enough to go through with it. But he had been, and he has the feeling that if it had continued on, it would have turned into some kind of three-ring circus that would have been impossible to sort through.

There were too many stories tied into one situation, and the sad part about it is that none of them were good.

It wasn't wrong to shoot someone in self-defense, or in the defense of another, but he'd been trying for so long to keep the real story from getting out that somewhere along the line, he'd forgotten what could happen. Had forgotten that the past could sometimes blow up in your face and that if Internal Affairs got involved, they could go looking as far back as they wanted to, and odds were that they would find something to either condemn you or redeem you. It had been both in this case. He knows that he owes Lupo and even Detective Bernard for what they did to prove that he was indeed innocent of any wrongdoing, but it doesn't change everything else that had happened. Lieutenant Van Buren had told him that he could fight to stay on as NYPD, because there were no criminal charges and dismissal wasn't automatic. He'd told her he was too worn out to fight anymore.

Yesterday, he had been Detective Green, but today, he is only Ed, and whether or not this actually hurts yet, he isn't particularly sure of.

What he does know is that April Lannen's secrets are out in the open and so are his own, and it's the last thing he wanted to happen, and the last thing that did happen. What he does know is that if he hadn't slipped back into old habits after Lennie had died, none of this would even be happening now. At least, the secrets coming out part. Bunny still would have murdered someone, and he still would have been arrested at one point or another, but there would have been no secrets out in the open, no airing of dirty laundry. Ed knows that he can't particularly fault Cutter and Rubirosa for doing their jobs, because, honestly, he knows it isn't easy, even on their side of the line.

The world isn't always in black and white. The problem with this is that there are too many shades of gray.

When he'd told the lieutenant that he was too tired to fight back, he meant it. He'd been a cop, but he had been a cop with issues, and he'd known it. Every now and then it just got to the point where it was too hard to want to go on, and he'd finally gotten to the point where he didn't think he could do it anymore. April would be fine, and so would he, but there was no looking into the future, and no seeing what would happen. He wonders for a moment if the thought bothers him, but decides that it doesn't, because it can't, and if he lets it, then nothing will get done.

Once upon a time, the NYPD and Lennie Briscoe saved him from himself, and coming to a standstill and staying there would be a disservice to both, even if he isn't a cop anymore.

There are too many things that he could do, too many things that once upon a time, he'd wanted to do, and now isn't sure he still can. Part of him wants to leave the city, but most of him wants to stay, because this is home, and he can't just pick up and walk away. There is so much to be had and so much yet to be lost, but if anything, he knows that he needs to keep moving, because if he doesn't, it'll all come crashing down on him. He wonders when it got to the point where he was willing to serve time to keep everything from coming out into the open, and knows that if not for April, he'd be doing this reflecting inside a prison cell.

We thought you were worth saving, Cutter had said, and maybe even meant it. There'd been a point when he hadn't been too sure of that.

But that point, too, had come and gone. April had been the victim of circumstance, of running into him in the first place, and learning to do what had gotten her so far in trouble in the first place. And he, well…he had been the victim of his own stupidity, really, allowing himself to get suckered in by the so called glamour of it all and finally letting it get to the point where it threatened to blow up in his face and actually did. If he was worth saving, if they were both worth saving, then it only seemed fitting that everything came out in the open at the same time, but on the other hand, it didn't.

How do you do it, he'd asked, and had received a simple answer. One foot in front of the other for thirty years.

The theory is one that he has thought of on and off for the past few years, but only now that he does not know what will happen, only now that things are so uncertain does he really understand it.

And he isn't particularly sure where he's going to land this time…but there is some measure of relief in knowing that someone will care to know when he finally does.


End file.
